


This Simple Feeling

by writeonclara



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pining, Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Touch-Starved, accidental shifting as an avoidance tactic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 09:00:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20061418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writeonclara/pseuds/writeonclara
Summary: Crowley hates being a snake. But if it means he can selfishly steal pieces of affection from Aziraphale, well,upon thy belly thou shall go.





	This Simple Feeling

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the kinkmeme prompt:  
Crowley isn’t really that comfortable in his snake form but it has its advantages in that he can climb all over Aziraphale when so much as brushing hands seems like a huge deal in human form. 
> 
> -this was heavily inspired by this https://kaenith.tumblr.com/post/144918326353/i-recently-realized-ive-never-posted-a-single so if you want to have Crowley accidentally turning back into his human form making them realize exactly what’s going on, bonus points
> 
> Link: https://good-omens-kink.dreamwidth.org/616.html?thread=360296#cmt360296
> 
> Title from Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

1.

Love. Bah. Love is just another overused trope that hack musicians write about when they’re desperate for their crap single to take off. Love is an excuse for terrible poets to write verse after verse about flaming desire devouring their internal organs (or something—Crowley may have taken credit for terrible poetry at some point centuries ago, but he hasn’t _read_ the stuff). Love is—the point is—the point _is_, Crowley is in hack music, bad poetry _gross_ kind of love with a certain bookshop-owning, tweed-wearing, cocoa-drinking Principality, and he has _no idea_ what to do about it.

He hadn’t even realized he had feelings for Aziraphale until he walked through those blazing doors and thought, _oh, he’s dead_, and it became obvious in its absence, a terrible void yawning open in his chest. And then Aziraphale had returned, alive(ish) and well(ish), and it had all come roaring back into him, like the tidal wave that had shoved Noah’s ark out into the open sea. Then the failed Armageddon, and now here, back at the restored bookshop after a night at the Ritz, three sheets to the wind like nothing at all had happened, and Crowley is _madly in love_.

“So what am I supposed to do about it?” he asks.

Aziraphale blinks up from where he’d been contemplating his glass of 1959 Bordeaux. “What was that, my dear?”

Crowley blinks back at him over the top of his sunglasses, which had been slowly tiptoeing their way to the bridge of his nose during the night. “Say you’re—say you have this—thing. A, um, a fern. One of those spiky kinds.”

“Alright,” says Aziraphale, nodding to show that he’s following along so far.

“And you think that maybe you, ah, you want to give this thing—this fern—to a friend who you think might possibly appreciate a spiky fern.”

A small line puckers between Aziraphale’s eyebrows, and oh no, Crowley’s losing him. Best to simplify.

“But what if it turns out your friend doesn’t actually want the fern, because he’s more of a—a campanula kind of bloke, only he might take it anyway because he’s too polite to say he’s not all that keen on ferns, especially not the _spiky_ kind. And then the fern withers and dies in a dark corner because even though they’re tough old weeds, they need some attention, too.”

“Crowley,” says Aziraphale, slowly, like he’s trying out his name for the first time. The groove between his eyebrows has deepened considerably. “Do you—want to give me a fern?”

Crowley claps his hands together, then points a finger at Aziraphale. “Yes!”

“Oh, my dear boy,” says Aziraphale, clearly touched. “I may not have a green finger like you, but I assure you, I won’t shove your fern in a corner and leave it to die.”

“Green thumb,” Crowley corrects, automatically. Then he lowers his hand. “Wait, no. The fern is a metaphor.”

Aziraphale sighs. “I have no idea why you always must complicate things.”

“I’m not _complicating_ things, I’m just speaking in—in hypotheticals.”

“Oh, grand. Metaphors and hypotheticals.” Aziraphale tops off his glass, clearly deciding he needs to drink more to understand Crowley’s boozy logic. “What does this hypothetical metaphor represent, then?”

“It represents—it representsss—”

Aziraphale abruptly disappears.

Or rather—or rather Crowley’s perspective has suddenly changed. The edge of the table, which he had been insouciantly leaning against, is now eye level. Had he slipped down his chair? It wouldn’t be the first time horizontal objects had defeated him after several bottles of wine. He tries to push himself back into a sitting position and slithers right off the chair with a _whoomp_ and a surprised hiss.

Aziraphale peers over the top of the table, blinking owlishly. “What—just happened?”

Instinctively, Crowley coils up and—oh. He’s turned into a snake. He hasn’t accidentally shifted since—actually, he’s _never_ accidentally shifted. Apparently, his body had decided _right, then, let’s put a stop to all this before we commit verbal suicide, yeah?_ and had gone long and scaly out of self-preservation.

Aziraphale crouches in front of him, and Crowley lifts himself up, stretching his long body so that they can look eye to eye. “Did you mean to do that?” asks Aziraphale, concern writ large all over his soft face.

Crowley shakes his head.

Aziraphale clicks his tongue, and then—and then he _lifts Crowley up_, which is just not on. Crowley tries to wriggle away, but Aziraphale gathers up his entire lengthy body and cradles him close to his chest, and actually his hands are rather—soft, and quite warm, and are holding him so gently, like he’s something precious.

“Oh—hello, what?” says Aziraphale, startled, as Crowley wends his way up his chest and to his neck. He half expects Aziraphale to rip him off and banish him to the sea, à la a certain saint who had _not_ chased Crowley out of Ireland, thank you very much. He’d left on his own accord. Instead, Aziraphale rests a hand on Crowley’s side, gentle, always so gentle. “Well, if you must,” he says, and Crowley can hear a smile in his sigh.

_Oh_.

2.

The problem with Crowley’s face is that, even if he keeps his teeth clamped firmly together, his expressions tend to loudly shout every idle thought that blows through his mind. And now, sitting in the new Burmese restaurant down the block and listening to Aziraphale prattle on about his forays into modern bebop and how he’s particularly fond of George Harrison’s _What Is Life_, Crowley is blindly, deliriously happy, and it shows. He can feel how his grin has spilled messily all over his face, sharp and just hungry enough that the lady at the next table has covered her jugular with her napkin and the man across from her is fiddling with his salad fork menacingly.

Aziraphale stops mid-word, cocking his head to the side like a bird. He’s not quite frowning, but the skin at the corners of his eyes have tightened slightly in the suggestion of one.

“What is it? Why did you stop?” asks Crowley, his own grin fading into a softer smile that has the rest of the room releasing their collective breath.

“It’s just that I haven’t seen you smile like this since you tempted that entire order of nuns to your side,” says Aziraphale. “What were they called again? The Babblers? The Blatherers?”

“The Chattering Order of Saint Beryl’s.”

“Right, them,” says Aziraphale. “So? What’s got you looking like you’ve tempted over The Silent Order of Saint Benedict?”

Crowley’s wild grin stretches over his face again. “I’m just so—” _in love_, his mind tries to confess, but his mouth stops him. _Happy_, he tries to say instead, but even that’s far too revealing. But he _wants_ to tell him, rather desperately. He thinks that if he can just find the right words, his life would slide into an incandescent level of perfection. He could be even happier than he is now. _They_ could be happy, maybe. It’s just that Aziraphale is watching him with expectant eyes, and everything inside of Crowley is both clambering around and clamming up. Because, while he knows exactly how he feels, he has no idea how _Aziraphale_ feels.

“Well?” asks Aziraphale, lifting both his eyebrows expectantly.

* * *

In retrospect, shifting into a snake to avoid further questioning had not been his brightest idea.

* * *

“I hope you’re happy,” says Aziraphale as they walk back towards the bookshop, the screams of terrified patrons following them out of the restaurant. Rather, Aziraphale is walking. Crowley is slithering miserably along. The sidewalk is filthy, and grating against his scales, and just this side of too cold.

“Now we can never go back to that restaurant,” sighs Aziraphale. “I rather liked their tea leaf salad.”

Ahead of them, a woman carrying two Tesco bags screams suddenly and flings the bags at Crowley, missing him by some minor miracle. Crowley’s tongue flickers in amusement. At least something good has come from this wretched experience.

“Really, my dear,” says Aziraphale, long suffering. “Won’t you change back?”

Not a chance.

Aziraphale huffs in irritation, then stoops down and picks him up. Gratefully, Crowley slithers up to drape himself around his neck.

“Oh, my poor dear,” murmurs Aziraphale. “Look at the state you’re in.” He plucks off a piece of chewing gum from Crowley’s back, causing his muscles to ripple with pleasure at the tender grooming. Crowley nestles his nose closer to Aziraphale’s warm jawline, inhaling his scent: the spicy, human cologne, and underneath, sweet, like fairy floss or confectioner’s sugar.

Maybe he can’t say how he feels just yet, but he could be content with these small scraps of affection, for as long as Aziraphale will allow it.

3.

The cheery little bell Aziraphale had installed over the door to warn him when someone’s entered his shop tinkles merrily over Crowley’s head. He takes off his sunglasses, buffs a lens with his sleeve, and shuffles them into his front pocket.

“We’re closed!” calls Aziraphale from the back room.

Crowley takes a step forward, and then hesitates. The thing is, he’s been thinking. He knows his own feelings, even if it’s taken him millennia to admit it to himself. His love is all-encompassing, loud, bright, overwhelming. He loves with every millimetre of his tiny, black, graceless heart. But, just as he knows his own heart, he’s equally certain of Aziraphale’s, and he knows that there’s no way the angel could love him back. No, not like this. His only respite is that for some reason, Aziraphale tolerates affection by the proxy of Crowley’s snake form.

So, snake it is.

He finds Aziraphale stooped over his desk, reading glasses perched on the edge of his nose, thumbing through a book with latex-covered fingers. The desk is a bit of a conundrum, but he manages by stretching up as far as he can without unbalancing. He manages to hook his chin over the edge of the desk and haul himself up. Not exactly _cool_, but it gets the job done.

“Oh, hello,” says Aziraphale, blinking at him over the top of his glasses. “Snake again?”

Aziraphale’s arm is resting on the table, so Crowley slithers onto it, using it as a bridge to get to his usual resting place draped around Aziraphale’s neck. Like this, he can feel the flutter of the angel’s pulse against the beat of his tiny snake heart.

“I was wondering, my dear—well, it’s been awhile since we’ve been to the Ritz, hasn’t it?” Aziraphale asks, unthinkingly sliding a finger down Crowley’s back. Unfortunately, the latex of his gloves sticks against his scales, which rather has the feeling of being pet backwards. Crowley growls in displeasure, entire body contracting at the unpleasant contact.

Aziraphale jerks his hand away. “Oh! I’m terribly sorry.” He cranes his neck down, frowning a little at Crowley. “That’s terrifying. I had no idea you could growl like that.”

Crowley bumps his head affectionately against the side of Aziraphale’s soft jaw, as if to say _no harm done, just lose the gloves, there’s a good chap._

They can’t have been friends for as long as they have without developing an unspoken language. Aziraphale dutifully pulls off his glove one finger at a time, then sets to idly petting Crowley’s neck. Crowley’s eyes drift shut in bliss.

“—as I was saying,” says Aziraphale. “It’s been awhile since we’ve been to The Ritz…”

4.

They don’t end up going to The Ritz. It’s mostly Crowley’s fault.

“You stubborn old serpent,” Aziraphale sighs, when he comes across Crowley sprawled out over the couch, next to the book Aziraphale’s been studying for the past couple of weeks. Before shifting, Crowley had folded Aziraphale’s reading glasses and had set them on top of the book, a blatant invitation, and probably showing every card in his hand.

“So what is this, your new form of choice?” says Aziraphale, tetchily, but he still picks up Crowley and lets him loop around his arm and rest his chin on his shoulder.

Actually, Crowley hates being a snake. But if it means he can selfishly steal pieces of affection from Aziraphale, well, _upon thy belly thou shall go_.

Aziraphale sighs again and strokes the top of Crowley’s head. “I wish, my dear, that you would tell me whatever has been bothering you so much that you would take refuge in this form.”

“_No way_,” hisses Crowley.

5.

They’re sitting on Aziraphale’s couch. Well, Aziraphale is sitting on Aziraphale’s couch. Crowley is sitting on Aziraphale. Not quite sitting, either; rather he is, as usual, draped around him like an oversized shawl. Aziraphale is absently stroking his back while he thumbs through a well-read copy of _Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea_. Clearly an Adam enhancement. Crowley stretches out to read over his shoulder, although this has been going on for long enough that he can admit, never out loud, that it’s just a flimsy excuse for him to rub his face along the side of Aziraphale’s smooth cheek.

“Crowley,” mutters Aziraphale, his touch gentling. “You know you can touch me in whatever form you’re in.”

Crowley freezes.

Aziraphale closes his book with a quiet snap, then folds his hands on his lap. There’s a fine tremor going through his fingers. He isn’t looking at Crowley; rather, he’s staring straight ahead. “Crowley, you must know—you _must do_—you know that I can feel love.”

When Crowley first fell, he’d just been swept down with the crowd. He’d taken one look at the army of angels waving around great bloody flaming swords and thought, _this really isn’t for me_. This, though. This feels like _falling_. Like the entire world has been yanked out from under him and has sent him spiraling off into the stars.

“I felt it,” says Aziraphale, words tripping over themselves, as if he’s afraid that if he doesn’t get them out fast enough, Crowley will miss it, having _exploded_. “The moment you fell in love with me.”

Crowley pops back into his human form, mostly so that he could shout, “_What_?”

Aziraphale catches his hand before he can slither away, wrapping it in a bone crushing grip. It’s awkward, since Crowley’s half-sprawled on Aziraphale’s shoulders, half-sprawled on the back of the couch. “It was—it was when we were sharing that bottle of 1959 Bordeaux, wasn’t it? I thought maybe I’d misread it—I was awfully drunk, you see, and thought that maybe it was wishful thinking, and then you kept talking about _ferns_ of all things—”

“_What!_” Crowley shouts again.

“Oh, do get off my shoulders. I am not your coat rack,” says Aziraphale, irritably, and shoves at Crowley’s shoulder.

“I don’t know what _you_ do with coat racks, angel, but _I_ don’t sit on mine,” says Crowley, scathingly, but he dutifully clambers off.

Aziraphale climbs to his feet, apparently not wanting to be the only one sitting for this conversation. But six thousand years of _not_ discussing feelings catches up with them, and Crowley dusts the front of his shirt, and Aziraphale wrings his hands together.

“You _knew_?” Crowley finally manages to squeeze out. Then he shakes his head jerkily. “Wait—wishful thinking?”

“Hell,” curses Aziraphale, covering his face with his hands. “Would that _I_ could turn into a snake.”

“Aziraphale—”

“Yes, yes, alright,” Aziraphale snaps. But since he’s the Principality who’d been charged with guarding the Eastern Gate, and therefore actually has a set on him (with some effort), he lowers his hands from his face to meet Crowley’s eye and only blushes a little. “I just—_do_ you? Because I thought you did, only you haven’t said anything and—and while I love you in whatever form you’re in, I just—couldn’t be sure. Not when you’re a snake.”

Crowley stares at him. “That’s a lot.”

“_Crowley_,” says Aziraphale, miserably. “Put me out of my misery, if you please.”

“I do,” says Crowley. He tries to say the actual words, but his tongue gets twisted, and so he just continues to stare helplessly at Aziraphale and hopes he gets it.

Aziraphale’s face breaks out into a blinding, beautiful, _ridiculous_ smile. “Oh, wonderful. I was hoping you did.”

6.

Late in the night, a large black snake slithers next to a dozing angel. The angel hadn’t slept in ages, but these days he’ll nap here and there, provided he’s got the right company. The snake coils up on the angel’s pillow, resting its head on the angel’s neck.

“_I love you, too,_” it hisses.

The angel smiles in his sleep.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] This Simple Feeling](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20739332) by [PhagePods (justaphage)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/justaphage/pseuds/PhagePods)


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